Interview with Karen Yasinsky
Ali Aschman and Jeremy Bessoff in conversation with Karen Yasinsky on the occasion of the screening ‘Fire is a Fact: An Evening with Karen Yasinsky’, a program of short puppet and hand-drawn animations from 1999 to 2012. Ali: When Jim Trainor introduced you last night at Conversations at the Edge, he described your work as […]
February 21 – Fire is a Fact: An Evening with Karen Yasinsky
Thursday, February 21, 6 p.m. | Karen Yasinsky in person! In the strange and seductive animated films of Baltimore-based artist Karen Yasinsky, an eyeless woman is abandoned in a landscape of wolves, boys writhe restlessly in a cowboy-papered room, and characters from Jean Vigo’s L’Atalante (1934) and Robert Bresson’s Au Hazard Balthazar (1966) act out […]
February 14 – Fern Silva: Concrete Parlay
Thursday, February 14, 6p.m. | Fern Silva in person! Fern Silva’s invigorating, geographically-sweeping films bring together sounds and images of nature, ritual, and pop culture from Europe, South America, the Middle East and the United States to explore ideas of travel and cross-cultural movement. “The disorienting whirl of the compass,” suggests curator Aily […]
November 15- John Akomfrah: The Nine Muses
Thursday, November 15, 6 p.m. | John Akomfrah in person! The Nine Muses, the 2011 feature by British filmmaker, artist, and co-founder of the 1980s Black Audio Film Collective John Akomfrah, journeys through the history of African and Caribbean migration to post-war Britain through the lens of Homer’s revered epic poem The Odyssey. Structured as […]
November 8- Lawrence Jordan: Beyond Enchantment
Thursday, November 8, 6 p.m. | Lawrence Jordan in person! Best known for his singular cutout animation style, the films of avant-garde great Lawrence Jordan channel the unconscious through surreal compositions of found graphics, drawings, and engravings. Jordan co-founded Canyon Cinema, collaborated with the likes of Stan Brakhage and Joseph Cornell, and continues to make […]
October 18- LAIDA LERTXUNDI
Thursday, October 18, 6 p.m. | Laida Lertxundi in person! Shot within and around Los Angeles, Laida Lertxundi’s seductively enigmatic films mix soul music and art punk as non-actors lounge within sublime beachscapes, cheap motels, and light-flooded apartments. My Tears Are Dry (2009) is a luscious and melodic composition that lures the viewer into and […]
October 4- HITO STEYERL
Thursday, October 4, 6 p.m. | Introduced by Lisa Dorin, Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art at the Art Institute of Chicago Hito Steyerl’s masterfully orchestrated video essays chart the lives of images, objects, and places to arrive at provocative new conclusions about their meaning.This program features two of these works, Lovely Andrea (2007) and In Free Fall […]
Tomonari Nishikawa & Small-Gauge Japan
March 8, 6pm | Tomonari Nishikawa in person Tomonari Nishikawa, Tokyo-Ebisu (2010). Courtesy the artist. Working in formats ranging from Super 8 to 35mm still photographic film, Tomonari Nishikawa constructs his films through precise single-frame shooting, elaborate masking, superimposition, and in-camera editing. He transforms the elements of urban life into multilayered abstractions of light, movement, […]
Radical Light: Alternative Film and Video in the San Francisco Bay Area /// New Prints/New Preservation
February 16, 6:00 p.m. | Introduced by Steve Anker, curator and Dean of the School of Film/Video at CalArts Image from Peggy and Fred in Hell: The Prologue (Leslie Thornton, 1984). Courtesy the Pacific Film Archive Library. Since the 1940s, San Francisco has been both a haven and inspiration for an influential constellation of moving […]
We Began By Measuring Distance
Thursday, February 9, 6:00 p.m. | Basma Alsharif in person! Introduced by Tirtza Even! Basma al-Sharif, We Began By Measuring Distance (2009). Courtesy the artist. “We Began By Measuring Distance” reflects on intrinsic and imposed distances—physical, logistical, and psychological—represented in works by women filmmakers from or connected to Palestine, including Jumana Emil Abboud, Basma Alsharif, […]
« go back — keep looking »About
Conversations at the Edge is a weekly series of screenings, performances, and talks by groundbreaking media artists.
CATE is organized by SAIC's Department of Film, Video, New Media, and Animation in collaboration with the Gene Siskel Film Center and SAIC's Video Data Bank.
Programs take place at the Gene Siskel Film Center (164 N. State / Chicago, IL / 312.846.2600), unless otherwise noted.
